sky in this pie
by coeur de lyon
Summary: NejixTenten Oneshot: Fire, friendship, perseverance and...aliens? A resolution in Earth Country.


A/N: I noticed a trend. Most of the NejixTen fics I write (and mostly all the others, too) centre around water. Storms and rain and rivers (and showers ;D)… not all of them have been uploaded, but the precedence is there, for sure.

So I determined to write something about something else. Yes. That sentence was _so_ clever. Anywho, here's 'sky in this pie', for a change of scene. The title actually made sense for about three full seconds in my head, before I just decided I liked the sound of it XI Enjoy.

Disclaimer: PROCEED WITH CAUTION, EPITHETS AHEAD. Does Kishimoto use epithets? I think not! At least, not like I do…thus it isn't mine.

'Earth' in this refers to Earth Country. Aka Tsuchi no Kuni. Mkay?

Cheers to NGD Omega and akun50 for their help x0x0x

**sky in this pie**

_Gare de Lyon_

The fire hisses, snaps it's teeth, and the smoke it releases billows up to the nighttime sky in a column, that doesn't dissolve in the gradually colder air.

It _is_ cold here, Neji can feel it aching in his bones, and occasionally he shivers. He doesn't move closer to the smoky campfire though, the one that will tell whatever else lurks in this bleak corner of Earth Country exactly where to find them, because he advised against lighting it; and because the smoke hurts his eyes (his clan eyes) more than he is quite willing to deal with.

Lee is a cross-legged lump, even further away than Neji, keeping watch; back still straight, alert to the dark and all the nocturnal whispers of the narrow gorge. Warmer, in his form-fitting clothes. Tenten though, is close to the flames.

Their glow gilds her the colour of the sunset (that has gone now) against the cliff at her back, and she is so still that sometimes he forgets she's even there. She stares into the burning rubbish (scraggy roots, sap-wet wood, the old dressings of her arm wound) and sometimes her ochre eyes reflect the flurries of sparks that burst spasmodically from the burning branches. And sometimes they don't.

She hasn't said a word now, not since the fire was first lit, and to the boys on her team her silence is unsettling. Unnatural enough that Lee doesn't speak either, and Neji finds it ironic that he misses their sound. When a breath of frigid air causes her to stir, curling her legs up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them, the movement carries over to him the smell of hot metal, and the sick-sweet tang of death.

Tsuchi no Kuni is a land where Tenten fits in far more than she does in Konoha. Her skin is the same shade as that of the locals, and _their_ eyes, too, vary from deep earthy brown to light honeyed amber, so usually it's Tenten who haggles prices when they need to buy something, or asks directions when they need to go somewhere, in this far-flung corner of the Elemental Countries.

Her scroll lies at her feet. Neji notices, when her gaze flickers down to scrutinise the paper. The blood is gone now, is her first priority afterwards; but the smell never quite disappears, no matter how meticulously she cleans. Hasn't ever quite vanished, not since she first started using her weapons for what they were properly meant to be used for, which is killing.

In Neji's sometimes-fantasies about what would happen, if he brought her home, Tenten is beautiful (because she is) and dressed in the fine, formal sorts of clothes that his cousins wear to ceremonies. Sometimes, her hair is brushed out and shining, a cascade of deep black-brown, longer than any Hyuga's and more exotic with it's hints of rose and gold, like the plumage of an old phoenix. She is grave and courteous and all his cousins are astonished by her, and jealous of him; and Hiashi takes him aside to commend him on his choice of friends; and knowing this and being able to take it for granted is this precious feeling. One that he wants to hold on to.

But sometimes Tenten-as-she-sometimes-is turns up in his daydreams instead. Tenten of the flashing eyes, Tenten of the cold-gold glow, of the old blood smell and the no-family feralness; and his family are terrified of her, of a sixteen-year-old girl; Tenten on-the-prowl, holding her separation like a kunai to the clan's throat.

He knows his perceptions of her are incomplete, that Wild Tenten and Grave Tenten need to meet and meld together with the sort of person she is tonight; who stares deeply into a fire, exhausted and cold and injured and vacuous, who doesn't say a word; and that he probably won't ever see the whole picture of his teammate (Tenten who defies his eyes) because she doesn't know, either. She knows that she's an alien, was found alone on the Konoha road, one day when she was four, and he knows it too, and understands (a little), why she hates missions in places like Earth, where she could belong to any of the people they meet (Tenten the teacher).

Suddenly she registers that he's watching her, and her eyes zero in on his across the fire. For what seems like an aeon she locks their eyes, although he knows it's only a few seconds before the fire crackles and smoke obscures them from each other. That only a heartbeat or so passes before she grimaces as she moves, startled, and makes her arm bleed afresh.

It will scar well; cleanly; because the shinobi she killed had steel that was fine and tempered in water and shone blue as it sheared through her muscle, but he moves across to her, and applies the healing jutsu she doesn't have enough chakra for at the moment – the one she said she didn't need – anyway. And her eyelids begin to droop as the pain ebbs.

She falls asleep on his shoulder, her hair glinting rose-russet-gold-black in the light of the fire, and Neji realises that even though he might never see her, wholly; he wants to try to.

(Tenten who makes him persevere)

As the fire dies down to gentle embers, Neji resolves to place the pieces together.

/Story. Cheers for reading.


End file.
